British army officer accused of leaking Afghan deaths data

A senior British army officer has been arrested on suspicion of passing sensitive information to a researcher working for the campaign group Human Rights Watch in Afghanistan.

Lieutenant Colonel Owen McNally, 48, is being held by military police in Kabul before being interviewed and flown home to face further investigation.

He has been working with the International Security Assistance Force in Kabul and is accused of giving civilian casualty statistics to the organisation, possibly in breach of the Official Secrets Act.

Last year, HRW said civilian deaths in Afghanistan from US and Nato airstrikes nearly tripled to at least 1,633 between 2006 and 2007. The group said it used "the most conservative figures available".

It added: "In 2007, more Afghan civilians were killed by airstrikes than by US and Nato ground fire. In the first seven months of 2008, the latest period for which data is available, at least 119 Afghan civilians were killed in 12 airstrikes."

Civilian casualties have been the subject of controversy, with campaigners alleging that official statistics on paper do not reflect the true number of deaths. It has been reported that US military commanders are "seething" over the allegations that McNally may have been leaking classified information on this issue.

Central to the controversy was a US airstrike on the town of Azizabad in the western province of Herat in which US forces said no more than seven civilians died but the Afghan government and United Nations said the toll was nearer 90.

The US began an inquiry after film recorded on mobile phones showed rows of bodies of children and babies in a makeshift morgue. The Pentagon later admitted that 33 had been killed. The incident prompted the Afghan government to review the presence of foreign troops and negotiate an end to airstrikes on civilian targets.

This month, HRW published an open letter to US defence secretary, Robert Gates, which claimed that "the US military's investigation into deadly and controversial airstrikes in Azizabad in Afghanistan in August 2008 was deeply flawed". It said: "Despite the commitments at high levels to reduce civilian casualties, unless proper procedures are put in place there is a high risk that additional US troops on the ground calling in more close air support will lead to a repeat of Azizabad and other errors, causing more and more civilian casualties."

Less than three weeks after the letter was published, McNally was arrested.

The Ministry of Defence said: "We can confirm that a British army officer has been arrested in Afghanistan on suspicion of breaching the Official Secrets Act. He is being returned to the UK for questioning. The investigation has been referred from the MoD to the Metropolitan police and is now under consideration. No further details will be released at this stage."